NAB has snapped up former Bupa head of marketing & brand strategy Kevin Ramsdale to bolster the senior marketing ranks of its personal banking business.
Ramsdale takes over as general manager marketing & research personal banking from Martine Jager who has moved to the position of general manager sales & distribution services retail.
Ramsdale will report to executive general manager strategy business development & marketing personal banking Howard Silby.
Silby told AdNews Ramsdale takes responsibility for marketing and research for personal banking, which comprises the majority of NAB’s marketing activity.
Personal banking is NAB’s consumer retail arm and includes direct banking, branch networks, NAB’s broker arm, its online bank UBank and consumer products such as mortgages and credit cards.
Ramsdale, who took on the head of product role at Bupa in October last year, after four years as marketing head, will start at NAB in mid-May. He previously spent 15 years at Ford Motor Company where he was national marketing manager.
NAB had a main media spend of $34.7 million in 2009, up slightly from the $34.5 million it spent in 2008, according to Nielsen. Its creative agency is Clemenger BBDO and ZentihOptimedia handles its media buying.
Bupa has replaced Ramsdale with GlaxoSmithKline marketer Miles Callaghan, who takes the title head of marketing strategy.
Callaghan spent five years in GSK’s marketing department across a variety of roles. Most recently he was director of strategy & commercial excellence.
Commencing the role on 27 April he will report to director of marketing product & corporate affairs Mark Engel.
“Miles will be responsible for developing the marketing strategy to drive the growth of the brands MBF, HBA and Mutual Community, in order to help Bupa become Australia’s favourite healthcare company,” Engel said.
Bupa, which comprised HBA and Mutual Community, merged with MBF to create Australia’s largest private health insurer in 2008.
In April 2009, Bupa consolidated its creative account into Clemenger BBDO and retained OMD on its media account.
Bupa had a main media spend of $15.4 million in 2009, down from $23.9 million in 2008, according to Nielsen.
Helen Schuller
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